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CQEUUGIIT DEPOSIT. 



THE FLIGHT OF GUINEVERE 
AND OTHER POEMS 



THE FLIGHT 

of 

GUINEVERE 

AND OTHER POEMS 

BY 

GEORGE V. A. McCLOSKEY 

Author of Lyrics'^ 



AUTHORS & PUBLISHERS CORPORATION 
Fourth Avenue and 30th Street, New York 

MCMXXI 



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Copyright, 1921, by the 
Authors & Pubushers Corporation 



DEC 30 1921 



e)r.l.A653317 



To all who seek and few who find I 

Our life is happiness if we 

Have but enough of life to be 

Active in body and in mind 

And clean of heart and in all free. 

The light of God on nature's face. 
Her music echoed in man's heart, 
Let all life to our own give grace, 
A freedom as of worlds apart, 
The soul of song, the scope of art. 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 

The Flight of Guinevere , . . . . 7 

Bird-song 24 

Cliff-dwellers 25 

Night by the Sea 25 

May Winds 26 

Dream and Dawn 26 

Awakening 27 

The Dryads 28 

Dreams All 28 

Idyll of Arcadian Singers 29 

Wayside Thoughts Z7 

Ponce de Leon 39 

Maiden 40 

Castles in Aik 40 

The Innocence of Childhood 41 

The Coming of Love 41 

La YtBxd 42 

Les Metamorphoses 42 

Hours of Youth 43 

Remembered Grief 43 

Melancholy . . :. 44 

Laughter 44 

To the Fairest .,.,.. 45 

The Lover's Reply 45 

Fame 46 

Robert Herrick . . . .» 46 

Poetic Truth . . . . « 46 

Bards of Old . . .; 47 



PAGE 

The Poet as Prophet 47 

Homer 48 

Song Perpetual 48 

The Poets of Our Mother Tongue 48 

Milton 49 

The Pilgrim Fathers 49 

George Washington 50 

The "President Lincoln" 50 

Theodore Roosevelt 51 

Our Country's Flag 51 

Old Glory 52 

Novus Ordo Seclorum 53 

Honor's Praise 54 

Death 55 

Oblivion 55 

Sic Transit Gloria Mundi 56 

The Colosseum 56 

"Anima Naturaliter Christiana" 57 

Midnight 57 

Hope Natural and Supernatural 58 

Enlarged 58 

The Unbeliever 59 

Man in the Universe 59 

To the City of San FRANasco Rearisen .... 60 



THE FLIGHT OF GUINEVERE 
I 

ARTHUR 

Hail and well met, Sir Bediverel 
All night I hastened to be here 
The sooner for Queen Guinevere 
To bid her know that all is well. 
Full little sleep had I yet fell 
Into a dream, as on I rode. 
That in a castle I abode. 
The hall was hung with trophies rare 
Of war and chase and pilgrimage, 
Gathered from noble age to age, 
And tapestries of many dyes 
Displayed before my eager eyes 
The feats of arms in old emprise. 
The rush-laid floor I made my bed. 
The knights upon the tapestries, 
As if with Lancelot at head. 
In sudden onset raised a breeze: 
I felt it on my forehead bare. 
I woke : the castle was not there. 
The hoofbeats died upon the air: 
The dream so lingered in my ears. 
A spell? A dream unworthy fears! 
Yet from the dream, as on I rode, 
Perforce some evil I forebode. 



But I am come and with no stay. 
The night has dreams but what the day? 
Blow royally: the Queen will rise 
More blithe and prompt to welcome me. 
What doubt, what dread, is in your eyes! 
What troubles all and where is she? 

She is fled! Yet let her flee 

If in flight her solace be, 

Lancelot in arms I seek 

For my heart I can not speak. 

Lancelot is vanished quite? 

Tho' he be the foremost knight 

Both in tourney and in fight, 

Yet he stayed not to withstand, 

Sword to sword and hand to hand. 

In such cause both king and right. 

And this by Lancelot was done I 
How many men there are in one! 
But Guinevere! She false! And who. 
If she is false, can yet be true? 

When first I saw thee, Guinevere! 

I would be King to make thee Queen, 

A queen to all in being mine! 

I felt: my destiny is here! 

For on the stair of light between 

The earth and heaven thou wast seen. 

Thy beauty was so all divine 

I deemed thy love should be no less, 

Thy soul the soul of nobleness. 

The silent laughter of thy look. 

Clear as the sunlight-paven brook, 

8 



Was like bright ripples of delight 
In all the course of day and night. 
As if, to form so fair a whole, 
God shaped thy person to thy soul. 
All love appeared thy due of old. 
The love that could not honor thee 
So much as it ennobled me, 
And for that love my heart grew bold 
To make all virtue and all duty 
Part of my love as of thy beauty. 
Fair bride I brought to Camelot! 
The skies might change — I saw it not — 
For of thy looks I took my fill 
And there the sun was shining still. 
I knew not where I set my pace : 
I lived as on thy lips a smile 
Still renewed by thy sole grace, 
And joy my kingdom was the while. 
In my first youth I seemed to be 
In being so made one with thee. 
Thy look, thy motion, mien and face 
Made graciousness the queenliest grace. 
The world before me, it was sweet 
To win and lay it at thy feet. 

Where is my lady-love? Ah! where? 
For I shall never find her more 
Upon the throne she graced before 
Nor even in herself so fair. 
She stepped with faery-footed ease 
And so much heart was in her look 
That every heart at once she took 
Who, darkly guilty, darkling flees. 

9 



Virtue, not passion, is the ground 
Where only constancy is found. 
Life? It was her inspiration. 
Death? Her kiss would have repaid. 
O the grievous change she made! 
Love her? 'T is to be betrayed. 
Not to love her — desolation ! 
Well it were for Guinevere, 
Well for me, could she have died 
Still my own and on her bier 
Had I fallen dead beside! 
All I am I made her crown. 
All, and she has cast it down 
Whom I loved above renown. 
Glory's look was in her eyes — 
Proud romance to fill the space 
Of a life-time with its grace. 
Ah ! how great the hope that dies ! 
Sick at heart am I to find 
She is so much flesh and blood 
And so little heart and mind. 
Life she knew not, only mood. 
But to me, who still draw breath, 
Bitterer than all other death 
Is it that our love should die. 
Yet no tender tears have I 
For their very springs are dry. 
Mocking visions of my youth — 
Hope and love and woman's truth — 
Let them not again come nigh! 
When shall I triumph, when have said : 
My heart is quiet now, quite dead? 
Yet no longer to feel pain 
Who would count it as a gain 
All unfeeling to remain? 

10 



I have so much grief to grieve 
That I can not well believe 
All is not a dream 
From which I shall yet awake 
And from my true being shake 
All it now may seem. 
Pain it is above all pain 
All I suffer is in vain. 
Show my foe : I strike him dead. 
But I feel a heart-sick dread 
Knowing not its object, whence 
Comes this blindly boding sense. 
All the wars that I have fought, 
All the works that I have wrought. 
All the ends that I have sought. 
All my life with labors fraught, 
All — I know it — shall be brought. 
As my love is, unto naught. 

The cry of hearts against their fate 
Was ever this : it is too late ! 
O destined consequence unthought 
Of act and word and will that sought 
Far other ends and this have wrought! 
We, too, are of the fates and weave 
At random or of purpose still 
The life for which we joy or grieve, 
The life that mocks our toilsome will. 
And darkly we at last are laid 
Like ghosts that make all hearts afraid 
Lest fate and heart be once displayed, 
Lest men be to themselves unmasked 
And by their secret being tasked. 
But we, the ghosts of what we were, 

n 



Yet walk without a sepulchre. 

Who of the nearest soul can know 

The stressful hour till this be past? 

Yet, had I won her long ago, 

She would have loved me first and last. 

Too late! It is thy thought as well, 

Self-banished Guinevere! yet dwell 

In peace, if peace be for thy heart, 

Till, as I deemed, all soul thou art! 

The great green earth, the great blue sky, 

While these remain, I would not die 

But pass where only these are nigh. 

Yet God will strengthen me again 

To go in power the ways of men. 

But call the bard whose words so long 

Have caught the heart up into song — 

The soul of beauty speaking truth, 

Imaginative evocation 

In cadences of new delight 

And rhythmic impulse free as flight 

Till all partake his inspiration 

As if in age restored to youth! 

If life have heart, it must have song 

And what is heartless, what but wrong? 

(THE BARD'S SONG) 

All our hearts, did they avow 
What they loved and dare not now. 
Some brave fancy would disclose. 
Deem we then that we grow wise 
That the heart itself denies — 
Inspiration quite forgoes? 
Hearts must still with fancy play 
Or begin to die away. 

12 



Our best deeds are fancies first. 
Heart! contract not: rather burst! 
How much greater what we are 
Than the greatest deed we do, 
So the soul, that action's star, 
Will outlive, transcend it too ! 
What if others still are blind 
To the knighthood that we own, 
For the brute is his own kind 
But the man himself alone! 
Were there on the earth but one 
Generous heart since time began, 
I would wish to be that man. 
Who would not when all is done? 
Not renown but deeds that best 
Merit fame shall be our quest. 
Virtue in restraint and action 
Has this godlike satisfaction 
That the heart it has illumed 
Is self-sustained, not self-consumed. 



(ARTHUR RESUMES) 

So make the hearer poet too ! 

The dream is still the strength to do. 

All strength am I, heart, hand and will. 

By opposition stronger still. 

No man is greater than his soul 

And none is less, so heart be whole. 

Greatness it is, altho' we fail, 

To have aspired. Our spirits hold 

What must escape the hand of mail. 

If all shall pass, as all of old, 

13 



The great design remains a thought 

Creating, godhke, out of naught. 

If Httle of our Hfe is flower. 

The range of action sweeter grows 

Than dreams of wingless faint repose: 

The truest calm is perfect power. 

II 

GUINEVERE 

Call my sister — abbess here — 

Tell her I am Guinevere ! 

"Welcome home 1" What kindly cheer ! 

For no longer Queen am I, 

Fleeing from my shame to die 

As one that never looked on high. 

Few upon the road I passed : 

The sky was shot with lightnings vast 

And once I saw by such a gleam 

A knight ride by as tho' in dream 

On such a steed as Arthur's. Yea, 

Ere he was 'ware, I was away 

Yet from my lips escaped a cry. 

I fled: I hid and none came by. 

Yet had I fled the palace gate 

For Arthur's wrath or Modred's hate 

Alone and with no more in mind 

I had not come a way so hard 

But taken ship to Joyous Garde 

And there my queenhood I should find 

With Lancelot who bade me flee 

With him who still would champion me. 

But for new wrong I had no heart: 

I would at once with all things part, 

14 



Even with Lancelot — for his sake, 
That from the spell he may awake. 
The fatal spell that I have wrought. 
I dared not tell him all my thought 
Lest I should weave another way 
The bond I loose for him to-day. 

Let Arthur think not I am changed: 
He never won me or estranged. 
My heart was Lancelot's alone 
Ere it was free to be my own. 
It was Sir Lancelot who came 
With Merlin of an elder fame — 
A power then and now a name — 
My hand for Arthur's self to claim. 
I in close-bound maidenhood. 
Narrowed to a household law, 
That new world of freedom saw 
In Lancelot and found it good. 
Who would not love that first of men 
Or, loving him, could love again? 
This I make not my defense: 
If I have not innocence, 
I would have and bear the truth. 
Not the falsehoods of my youth. 

But well I mind me how, a bride. 
With retinue of warlike port, 
I set out for Arthur's court, 
His ambassador beside. 
Green hills brightened by the sun, 
Darkly shadowed by the cloud. 
Deeply valleyed, fold on fold, 
Where the birds that answer one 

15 



Another mingle song with song 

Streaming all the way along 

Like the woodland waters loud ! 

There in state we passed of old 

On embowered roads that run 

Whijther none could tell for none 

Went so far before and we 

Wished them endless, thus to be 

Following joy and never done. 

When wide waters came in view 

To the tawny sands we drew. 

There the children follow after 

That retreating wave that swells 

On their flight till, where it laves, 

Fleetly will they gather shells — 

Whorls that ring with echoed laughter 

Of innumerable waves. 

There we moved in exaltation. 

There was action inspiration, 

Idleness a reverie. 

No word of love he spoke : no less 

Was every word a new caress. 

Cliff and surge and sky grew tender 

In one ruddy golden splendor. 

In our hearts — we felt their throbbing — 

All grew one with love, to be 

As many voices in one sea. 

Dawn, from seaward, breaking bright. 

Lifted all the hills to light. 

Let the loud sea break in sobbing 

And ocean's coming trumpets sound ! 

Inland anew our course we wound, 

Where change is one with rest and ease. 

Between the woodland and the seas, 

16 



Past hill-top, windmill, far-off steeple, 

By waste heaths and wondering people. 

The wild bird's song, the whispering trees. 

At last to Camelot we came 

And how the gathered throng had grown! 

My heart was borne on their acclaim, 

My heart that would have sunk alone. 

And I, already Queen in thought, 

To bridal and enthronement brought. 

Was carried onward, it would seem, 

As by the movement of a dream 

Nor felt the woman for the while 

Whom love could yet again beguile. 

Springtime anew, upon a day 
When the chase bore all away, 
With Sir Lancelot I came 
Where we passed before and I, 
Seated on a rock on high, 
Whence the world one could espy. 
Asked, without a thought of blame, 
Why the knight who ever bore 
Heart so nobly, arms so well. 
Never lady's favor wore. 
Silent, to his knees he fell : 
I bent o'er him: our lips met, 
Trembling, and I tremble yet. 
Too happy we that fatal day! 
The lonely lake that lay a-shimmer, 
A pool of sun, grew shadowy gray. 
In all the sky one cloud a-glimmer 
Was shaping to the wind in flight — 
A wraith of sunset. So came night. 

17 



No further of that love I tell 

But oft it chanced as then befell. 

I yielded for my love was blind 

Nor knew denial were more kind. 

How oft I grieved him for vain cause I 

Would I had broken for just laws! 

Too oft I felt — how frail we are! — 

The flesh is near and heaven is far. 

I had no will but what love would, 

Yet, having so much and no more, 

I longed at distance for all good 

And pride but as a shield I bore. 

Once fallen was no more to rise. 

For so it seemed to our own eyes. 

But all was fair to Arthur's gaze. 

My falsehood smote me in his praise. 

Much love may grow to more, ah, yes! 

But little love grows ever less. 

Arthur had glory for his part, 

To be of all the first in might. 

Breathing at once in every knight. 

With grappling hands he drew at length, 

Out of all things around him, strength. 

But beauty only from his heart 

To order chaos for a time 

And make the common world sublime. 

Arthur, Lancelot and I ! 
I should bear the grief of three 
As their griefs come all by me. 
Kingliest knight and knightliest king, 
Both to sorrow must I bring. 
Here I live and here I die. 

18 



I who wrought of ill the whole, 
I am powerless for good. 
Arthur comes not for he would 
Not reproach nor can console. 
Half his virtues, I must own. 
Were too quiet to be known 
But by virtue's eye alone. 
By what font of hallowing. 
Shall I meet thee, O my king! 
Soul to soul, O soul apart! 
Still be twice a king and bind 
Thy crown upon a kingly mind ! 
Wronged forever as thou art. 
Thou wilt pity my weak heart. 
Heart at war with all thy past! 
All sin is weariness at last ! 



Ill 

LANCELOT 

How came I to chance this way 
Where I find myself with day 
Breaking o'er the paths of night 
Steeped anew in dewy light ! 
Well I know the spot and here 
Brought — to Arthur — Guinevere ! 
She had hardy known what moved her 
And I knew not how I loved her, 
Till she stood at Arthur's side 
And I saw her as his bride : 
Our looks met and with a start 
Each beheild the other's heart. 

19 



How changed the season and our eyes 
How changed that challenge wintry skies ! 
The trees are bare of leaf and song; 
The ground is bare of snow or green, 
Only the wan brown herbage seen, 
Only black branches and gray sky, 
Wet hollows, wind-topped heights and long 
Far vistas from her rock on high. 
Come spring again, come song and bower, 
Come all the sun to winter bare 
With tender touch to make it fair 
With leafage fine and blossoms rare 
That, fallen, leave their riches there. 
But never to the broken bower 
Come Guinevere and I, her knight. 
Nor any voice of love's delight! 
The strain, the voice come o'er me here, 
That song she learned for Arthur's ear 
And felt for me — my Guinevere! 

(SONG) 

O would it were my lot to be 
Alone in sonle far isle with thee 
Where life is always youth and spring 
And never messenger might bring 
Word of the world or fear of fate 
But love be all and still elate! 

For so to hold thy single heart 
Hath more of sovereign and serene 
Than that a world should hail me queen. 
Yet since the great world will not part 
With thee, its glory, nor can I, 
Give song to me and all who sigh ! 

20 



Gone the secret hours when I 
Sang and she could make reply : 

(SONG) 

The proudest secret humbly broken 
Like bread before too great a guest 
Howe'er love speak, there's more unspoken. 

In lightest tone of slightest word 
The breathing soul of love confessed 
Is understood, if love have heard. 

Piteous, like a ghostly cry — 
A soul that would and may not die — 
Comes to me the song that I 
Did make to stifle every sigh 
When to love was love relief, — 
Comes but like another's now. 
Such the change upon my brow, 
And across a gulf of grief. 

(SONG) 

Never was there heart so free 
As our love hath made in me. 
Never love so fond. 

Birds will sing, for love is sweet — 
Lives how little yeit complete. 

Knowing naught beyond. 



21 



But my soul will find too small 
Kingdoms and adventures all, 
Having known thy heart. 

So will fancy soar in play 
On the wings love gave away. 
Love that will not part. 

Nay, I have not voice to sing 
Tho' a song were comforting, 
Were it, as I once could hear 
From the lips of Guinevere, 
Song to give the spirit wing 
Like a bird in arrowy flight 
From deep forest into sky 
With a joy as wide and high, 
Song to gloomy mood as bright 
As the rippling smile of light 
Though dark boughs upon a stream 
Where the wind will stir in dream. 
Easily as waters run. 
All as laughingly she sang 
Till the caverned echo rang 
Laughing from the dusk to sun. 
Heaven's sweet, earth's bitter, fruit. 
Love, within our hearts took root. 
Happy love, life's happiest. 
Often as our hearts drew near. 
Fled my guilt and fled her fear : 
Secret faith and perilous quest 
Made each fonder and more dear. 
Keenly sweet our every meeting 
For we knew that broken-hearted 
Yet not when we must be parted, 

22 



We who in our very greeting 

Trembled lest it be farewell. 

We sinned in love, not loved for sin; 

Only the best in each could win 

The other yet by this we fell. 

From the first have all things tended 

To the fate where they have ended. 

I who thought afar to range 

Feared to break her heart with change. 

Would the wars had carried me 

Far away, my queen! from thee 

Into strange lands oversea, 

There to leave a glorious name, 

There to raise, not mar, thy fame ! 

That was possible, but that we 

Should not love, it could not be! 

Life has been and death shall be 

In a deeper dream of thee 

For whose sake alone is life 

More than death and worthy strife ! 

She was fair and I was young — 
So is all the story told. 
How much grief the heart can hold 
And how little finds a tongue! 
Tho' from me the ears dissever 
All that once was mine, my queen! 
I forget not and forever 
It must be that this has been ! 
Dawn of yesterday must borrow 
E'en the sun to make the morrow. 
God who made the heart of man 
Heal my heart for none else can! 

23 



If the Grail I may not see, 

Let the quest enhghten me ! 

Such the hope that once I had ; 

So the Queen at parting bade. 

On the parting still I dwell — 

Broken words and fond replies ! 

As the light ihe dying eyes, 

So leave mine! The heart abides. 

Till death unite whom life divides — 

Ah, that it must be so ! — farewell ! 

BIRD-SONG 

A BIRD is singing. Let us hear, 
For, knowing we would listen near, 
How joyously he pipes and clear. 
As if within our heart alone 
To pour the fullness of his own ! 
Each sunward soaring, sparkling note 
He warbled from an open throat 
Has sunk in stillness to his heart. 
There echoed, throbbing there apart. 
Until for joy of so much sweet 
He will again the song repeat. 
Our silence is as feeling quite 
As e'en the voice of his delight 
And we are borne the while he sings. 
To other lands and other days, 
To youth that fled and dream that stays. 
His song, our thought, are all our wings. 



24 



CLIFF-DWELLERS 

In shadow here of rocks so high 
That we would flee to see the sky, 
The Httle birds that are how shy — 
Lest the wild silence so appall 
We find not in our soul a cry — 
Full softly twitter where they light 
And at a living tread they call 
Alarm and flight! 

NIGHT BY THE SEA 

Still lives the glory of the sun, 
Resplendent changes fading fast. 
And twilight comes — a star — but one — 
And all the stars of night at last. 
Mysterious heavens overhead, 
Mysterious waters wide outspread. 
Whose lights alone of ship and star 
Disclose the measureless afar. 
Darkling upon the shore are we. 
The shore at once of sky and sea. 
The twofold vast that, if we knew, 
Can not be taken at one view 
But must be felt by voyaging 
Long time with birds of strongest wing. 
What furthest heavens open lie! 
Yet half is hid by earth that rolls 
Midway between the starry poles. 
For we are travelers of the sky 
And now have somewhat of the sense: 
The world in darkness is gone hence. 
The stars are nearest to the eye. 

25 



MAY WINDS 

Plucking the blossoms and afar 
Voyaging, trackless as a star. 
And still uniting in thy mirth 
The touch of heaven, the breath of earth, 
Be winged like hours of laughing play 
Or unremembered thought and word 
Forgot in joy that spoke and heard, 
A springing joy that onward flows, 
O wind that makes the most of May 
As if each morn that comes and goes 
Were happiest that it is to-day! 
We who are longer young than old 
And much of youth in age may hold, 
Who but sojourn and must depart. 
The while go singing on and on 
With thee in fellowship of heart 
To see the world that God hath made. 
How all thy new old scent of spring 
To memory and sense can bring 
The breath of youth, the glad years gone 
And childhood's flowers that never fade, 
The flower-bells that faeries rang 
On meads of legendary youth 
Whose fallen blossoms seem to hang 
Once more on trees as old as truth. 

DREAM AND DAWN 

Wakening, hearing the birds, — in the shadow that 

dwelt on my eyelids, — 
Distantly, dreamily singing, I grew from the vague 

into selfhood. 

26 



Slumber to melt into melody, dream that can hear 

itself waken 
Linger no longer but leave me as one new-born of 

the daylight. 
Sun that enkindled a star, then the upraised face 

of the mountain, 
Vales that were hollows of dusk and the west that 

yet borders on darkness 
Flying before thee as nothing and stealing behind 

thee as all things, 
Sun! of thy making am I for not as I slumbered 

I waken. 

AWAKENING 

Across my sleep the thunder rolled 
And deeper still I slumbered till 
The dawn was red, the sunrise gold — 
How fair a world had day to fill! 

It seemed that life was new again 
Nor ever wore a look before 
So kindly and so purg as then. 
The past, my other life of yore, 

Such heart of peace did never know. 
When death is done, the vision won, 
So Paradise itself will show 
And we in God our spirits sun! 



27 



THE DRYADS 

True instinct found the dryads in the trees 
And gave a humanizing grace to these, 
Tho' mute and motionless until a soft 
Whisper will stir the rippling leaves aloft 
That shield from darting sun and pattering rain 
The cradled song-birds till they fly again. 
Nature a slayer and all life a spoil 
Elsewhere behold but, quickening the soil. 
The trees are nature's mildest majesty 
And grow to man an ageless memory, 
Shadowing o'er his birth, his home, his grave. 
Dryads ! the tree we plant, the grove we save 
And in the falling, springing leaves we view 
Our mortal end and endless hope renew! 



DREAMS ALL 

The visioned mind of sleeping sense 

The waking reverie. 
The will to make the thought intense. 

The fiery fantasie. 
As all are foreign, all are hence 

A dream, O world! to thee. 

Dreamer and dream are one indeed — 
There's so much truth in dream. 

The hidden heart of life is freed 
To be, in thought, supreme. 

As we in act, did all succeed. 

To all the world would seem. 

28 



The world may press and mold us till 

We seem its very own 
But yet do we escape it still 

And thank high heaven alone 
That from the world we fleet at will 

And all a dream is grown. 

No less the evil that we flee. 

The good that we embrace. 
O slavish world that hates the free! 

Why covet, why abase 
Our birthright, fancy, save it be 

A rich and signal grace? 

Pursued, the dream will lead us far 

Tho' all beside be night, 
For tho' \we never reach the star 

It reaches us its light. 
Our destiny we shall not mar 

Who hold to such a height. 

IDYLL OF ARCADIAN SINGERS 

A VALE, a flower in the rocks, lies open 

Only to rain and sky and towering sun — 

So do the uptossed mountains close it round, 

As if they loved it — and a torrent chill 

Falls, foaming, headlong from the height of dawn 

And dances, all in singing laughter, down 

To gleaming shallows till it slips away 

Under the wooded ridges, thence, afar, 

To issue, hallowed fount of other vales. 

Here had a wandering shepherd of the hills 

Found grace to see, at midnight, Artemis 

29 



Whose vesture, from her fairness, cast off light. 

Alone she came nor was the less a queen. 

So startled yet by beauty well assured, 

He knelt to her who chanted words of power 

And from that night no song was sweet as his 

And wild things of the wood were tame to him. 

But long of yore it chanced and he had long 

Gone hence yet never was his body found: 

So grew a whisper that the blissful gods 

In secret rapt him from the world away 

And of their lost Endymion did men tell 

Such tales as grow in telling, like a cloud 

That gathers fullness from the empty air. 

But he to song traditions true bequeathed, 

Old root of later flowers not elsewhere; found, 

And here the shepherds gather on a ledge. 

At hill-top, jutting o'er the valley view. 

Some tell their memories : the others speak 

Of present things and all now bid begin. 

The eldest, chill with age and fond of sun. 

For he was worn to sinews and a voice, 

Piped out to those who sat beneath the pines: 

Bring forth the vintage sealed away 
When I was young that so youth may 
Return if only for a day 
And pour to all the ruby wine 
And to the gods their gift divine! 

So warm the heart of life within! 

So rouse the fancy till it win 

Where speech will end and song begin — 

A heart too quickened to be still, 

A music singing as it will ! 

30 



Old in his own and young in elder eyes, 

Came one whose step was stately and yet light. 

Not youth but its remembrance and not age 

But its foreboding met in him who reached, 

At hill-top, nothing but the double view — 

Ascent, decline — and would no further go. 

To youth he turned, too weary-wise for play 

Yet half a playmate of old moods the while. 

As one who watches from a garden gate 

The flowers, the children, bees and butterflies, 

And, holding back for very ruth and fear 

Lest he do some displeasure to the scene, 

Feels his own childhood taking part in all. 

I still love youth now I grow old. 
Even the blind mistakes it made 
In hope that thought not to be stayed 
And warmth of heart how overbold! 
The thews that answer to the will, 
The eye of joy, I love them still. 

How fair is fame vv^hen toil is hope! 
How sweet the song as yet unsung! 
How full our love when we are young 
And heart can find in life its scope! 
What prudence can be worth in truth 
The generosities of youth? 

Of years had we in youth no fear 
And yet we lost it ere we thought 
Nor knew, until its passing wrought 
Such change within, it was so dear. 
We feel when only age is left. 
Our lives are of ourselves bereft. 

31 



They call on one long parted from these hills. 

A minstrel, he had sung in princes' halls 

And borne in alien wars a forward part — 

Each scar that marred him was a separate pride — 

Yet, having seen so much no longer new, 

To live with youthful memories returned 

But found the comrades of his prime were dead 

Or grown away from him as he from them. 

Hardly a thought in common, all were strange 

And none profuse of welcome and esteem 

Where, having left, he thought to find his home. 

So long away, he must again go hence, 

But, ere he went, he lingered: here he sang, 

Touching the lyre as careless of the prize: 

A vision came: 
Her look was love, 
Her voice was fame. 
Her breath was health. 
Her vesture wealth 
And joy above 
All joy her name. 
Such hope to youth! 
Has age, forsooth, 
A better truth? 
To men to-day. 
To gods to-morrow. 
Yet be as free 
The while as they 
Nor seek thy sorrow 
Ere this find thee. 
If all take wing, 
The joy is worth 
The grief of earth. 
Be strong and sing! 
32 



Little of all he sang had they at heart 

Yet some applauded for he came so far 

They thought his better than their native song 

And more had thought so but it sprang to mind 

That he was born their fellow countryman. 

Again he sang, forgetful of their use, 

As if among Ionian halls afar: 

Home is where we fix our heart, 
Whence with longing we depart. 
Whither we with gladness turn. 
There to find the single place 
Love and every fancy grace, 
Yet if on no hearth for me — 
Wanderer over land and sea — • 
Savors of such sweetness burn. 
Freedom is my fatherland 
And, however far it fly, 
Still I follow till I die, 
Song on lips and sword in hand ! 

All lightly turned to hear another sing. 

Take leave nor think to see again 
The earth, its waters and its heaven: 
What happy things the gods have given 
Yet happiness withheld from men! 
At birth, at dying — portals dim — 
There lieth pain, a warder grim. 
Where treasure is, a guard is set. 
All quick with spirit, ear and eye, 
Why should our life so fear to die? 
Life can remember, death forget! 
Perturb not we the quiet dead 

33 



But take their hallowed calm to heart 
And they will seem the less apart. 
They speak not for their lives have said. 
Their immortality we know 
By this, that they deserve it so. 

Then he was silent — he who sang of death 
And oft had faced it where the bravest stayed 
The foe in onset and the friend in flight — 
And silent too were all who stood about. 
Fallen in thought too deep to cry applause 
Which yet full many felt and he could not. 
By silence roused, they spoke among themselves : 
Some held the song ill suited festal hours, 
Some that the gravest is the worthiest theme. 
Some that poetic truth is only such 
The heart at once will know it for its own. 
For as it voices, so it touches hearts. 
The singing thought in singing words is song. 
Said one and others smiled: he had not sung. 
For critics seldom have the art they judge. 
To change their mood another shepherd sang — 
A youth that followed solitude and loved 
The upland pastures and the craggy ways 
Where shepherds go in summer and where he 
Would wander, browned with sun, amid the snow. 

The lightning, I have sped in the play of storm 
To flash here — there — in rapidly changing form 
While rumbles loud the stumbling thunder 
Treading the echoes of cloud and of mountain. 

Immortal. I awaken, to sleep anon. 
O leaping moments mine and as swiftly gone! 
What parching land is lying under? 
Cloud! to my falchion open a fountain! 

34 



The void, the dark, I touch with creative power 
And make the sky subHme in the dimmest) hour. 
The oak, the rock I rive asunder. 
Passing in glory, a god to men's wonder! 

The sun stood high : they broke off song and play 

With relish now for heartening repasts 

Ampler that each had brought some gift to all, 

Venison pasty, honey, wheaten loaves. 

Cakes and the cheese of flocks and spitted meats, 

Silvery fish from out the shadowed pool. 

Choice herbs, sweet apples, figs and garnered plums 

And berries gathered with the morning dew. 

But once, altho' with gust, they drank the wine 

And many times the sparkling mountain spring. 

There in the stillness of the afternoon 
When but the falling of a fruit is loud, 
One who had listened sang a hymn to Pan, 
Arcadian Pan, whose pipes were oftener heard 
In the well watered and well wooded vale 
When the forefathers came and were in awe. 

Pan, all seeing yet unseen, 
For whose footing all is green, 
For whose garland spring the flowers ! 
Pan, whose pipings soft and sweet 
Rest thee from the noon-day heat. 
Pause ere parting! Hearken ours! 

Ruler to whose bidding bow 
Dryad, faun and naiad, thou 
For whose thirst are running clear 
All the springs that took their laugh 
From thy lips that use to quaff 
Where the shepherd too hath cheer ! 

35 



Who should better sing to thee, 
Who should more thy favored be 
Than the dwellers of thy land? 
Strike each foe with common fear! 
Direful to his eyes appear ! 
Broken flee each hostile band! 

God of forest, flock and field! 
Songs of prayer and praise we yield 
Thee for all the days of peace, 
Days that bring to hill and fold 
The afterglow of the age of gold! 
Still be Pan and give increase! 

All liked the matter, some the manner too, 

A dancing measure and a happy tone. 

Their sentiment the many wish to hear 

Advantaged so upon another's lips 

And deem him greatest who is most themselves. 

A maiden who till then had stood apart 

Where, looking up, the sheep were listening still, 

Stept forward, gladly greeted, and her lyre 

Lightly she touched and sang in soaring tones: 

Tell me not thou lovest me. 
Dearest! lest I should believe! 
Bring me not such joy of thee 
Lest, remembering this, I grieve, 
For on others thou may'st shine, 
I by thee alone, all thine ! 

Love too deep to be denied, 
Love too shy to be confessed, 
Ah ! why draw it from my breast 

36 



Where it lives and should have died 
Only with this heart of pain? 
Stir it not to joy in vain ! 

Ne'er be fond or always true ! 
Ere thou changest, let me perish 
In the arms that now would cherish 
Me as if of them I grew! 
Rather, Fates! at once dissever 
Hearts ye can not bind forever! 

To her for prize a figured vase they gave: 
They pressed it on her, they who sung before, 
Loving her beauty more than their own praise. 
For joy she laughed aloud and all with her, 
So noble was the vase and in the midst, 
Austerely beautiful, Apollo seemed 
Laying aside the bow to take the lyre 
And triumph in his friends as o'er his foes. 



WAYSIDE THOUGHTS 

The flowers, many-hued, are everywhere 
I take my way to find the world so fair 
'T were Paradise if innocence were there. 
Newness to beauty, zest to happiness. 
Each season adds to bring us more, not less. 
A shower came and cleared: it made in air 
Murmur so peaceful, nature was in prayer. 
The clouds upon the horizon seemed to change 
Into a vaster, farther mountain range 
And would on high a world remaking show 
And one was like a mist of driving snow 

^7 



Against the sun that shot a sidelong rift 

Through the cloud-chaos in its windy drift. 

Earth is a freshened flower to the sun 

For all the clouds were rolled away like one. 

There were such sights in heaven as are not said 

Nor, without seeing, thought, but are, when fled 

From vision, never to remembrance dead. 

Dying, I shall recall such days as these 

And death will take of them a certain ease, 

Content that life has found so much in play 

Of sense and fancy, for it is a day 

Such as creation knew when light was made 

And universal darkness grew its shade. 

How every field and hillside has a voice — 

Each bird that carols still "Rejoice, rejoice!" 

Still would I look around and look above — 

The joy of life is all-embracing love — 

And still my thoughts would lighten to and fro 

For all is mine if but all thought is so. 

If well the music show the instrument 

And nature's gift be some divine intent. 

Do not her innate harmonies of love, 

The soul's true music, draw her looks above ? 

The soul would be immortal if she could: 

How comes it save by nature that she would? 

Her immortality we then admit 

If but our nature's wonted reach befit 

Our destiny, as reason is it should. 

And if on earth we hold such heavenly good, 

The impulse to immortal love and bliss. 

Immortal is the soul to compass this. 

Just out of view a thrush is singing free 

As if to endless memory in me. 

38 



Life too intense to know that it must die! 

singing joy too breathless for a sigh 

When the sweet note has borne thee heaven-high! 

1 too shall couch with death some sunless day 
Under the roots of spring, as if in play 
Hiding more shyly from the world away 

To quicken death to life that dies anew. 

The bloom, the mould what interchange pursue! 

What if the hills I trod in joy and laughter 

Forget me, if it be for joy hereafter? 

Let me be as the winds that have their will ! 

Forget me! But I shall remember still 

In what high peace of what immortal state. 

Where happiness can make the heart more great, 

And in my Father's house where I shall be 

What pleaseth Him and have what pleases me, 

I yet would have a window that should give 

Upon the happy land where I did live ! 



PONCE DE LEON 

His quest was youth — his youth of old — 
Youth that can turn all else to gold. 
No longer, ghost-like, would he rove 
But find within a far-off grove 
The fount of healing manifold. 

How strange a hope now hope is cold! 
But wonders did the age behold. 
When half a world was treasure-trove. 
His quest was youth. 

39 



A grave he found, the youthful-souledl 
Mindful no more his prime was bold 
But only how in age he strove, 
A legend of all hearts men wove 
Into the tale so often told : 

His quest was youth. 

MAIDEN 

Her finer sensibilities require 

Something as fine that they have never found. 

The springs of tenderness within her bound. 

Having no outlet to the sun, retire 

In unseen courses of the heart's desire 

And, like the waters passing underground, 

Marked by the verdure they have spread around. 

Well up in flowers, dewy cups of fire. 

Serenity, accomplished sacrifice, 

Are in her mien : there is no longer strife 

But joy of nature's gift, not at a price. 

Triumph and grief from her unworldly days 

Turn all their tumult, leaving her a life 

Of quiet uses and of gentle ways. 

CASTLES IN AIR 

Castles in air! with straining eyes. 
The sun I follow down the skies 
And rest my head on dream and dew 
Until I hear the hound pursue 
The stag to horn and hunting cries. 

The bannered courts of love, the prize • 
Of echoed song, as I grow wise. 
Living by hope, I change for new 

Castles in airl 

40 



Yet fancy! light e'en sorrow's eyes 
As sunny places where rain lies I 
My spirit with thy own endue! 
My flesh has felt immortal too 
And lightly still to song arise 

Castles in air! 

THE INNOCENCE OF CHILDHOOD 

O Paradaisal unity of soul 

To know no wrong and no division hence 

Of will and wit, of spirit and of sense, 

But goodness making all thy being whole! 

Why run apace, already at the goal? 

But dwell on earth as if in heaven. Thence 

Draw virtue which is still its own defence 

And happy impulse growing self-control! 

Childhood! how fortunate in age is he 

Who conquers still what he did then possess 

And joins the merit with the happiness 

Of innocence so perilously free — 

An innocence the world may take, not give ! 

What joy is more or can without it live! 

THE COMING OF LOVE 

The bonds of childhood are by youth undone 
And heart and action to one music move — 
Adventure and companionship in one, 
The thrill of beauty and the trance of love! 
Glamorous gay romance renewing story, 
The happy sympathies our natures find, 
Ideal impulse, worship crowned with glory! 
The heart has secrets even from the mind! 

41 



If from the body's fairness love outgrew. 
As wide as life and reaching still above, 
It ends not there: the soul began there too. 
Love to the soul belongs, the soul to love, 
And love can have no other measure than 
The greatness of the soul which is the man. 

LA V6RIT6 

Que la verite du coeur 
Seulement vous semble vraie! 
C'est I'amour dedans sa plaie. 
C'est I'eternel dans la fleur, 
L'ame dans la fantasie 
Et la beaute dans la vie. 

C'est la chanson du bonheur 
Tendre jusqu'a la tristesse. 
C'est I'enfance et la sagesse 
Se regardant dans un coeur. 
C'est la votre et pour tous comme 
La pitie divine a I'homme. 



LES METAMORPHOSES 

C'est des roses que I'abeille 

Fait son miel 
Dont la douceur est pareille. 
Les poetes, par un tel 
Changement meme du fiel 
Sur leurs levres, font merveille, 
Car, a force de douleurs, 

42 



La chanson, dans tous les coeurs, 
Comme d'abord dans les leurs, 
Saisit — affranchit — enflamme 
L'ideal et I'eternel, 
Le divin essentiel, 

Comme en I'homme Dieu fait Tame 
Pour le ciel. 

HOURS OF YOUTH 

Others will know the hours when longing still 
Is joyful, for *t is hope that looks before, 
When happy days may vanish as they will 
And we regret them not for we have more. 
Like unremembered dreams of smiling sleep, 
Days fell from us as if they were the moult 
Of growing wings o2 youth that were to sweep 
Forever o'er the falling thunderbolt. 
The soul was joy, the flesh the laugh of life: 
Hope triumphed in itself and would look o'er 
The far horizon with new heavens rife, 
So mystery leads young spirits and the more 
In them will charm us who discern alone 
Stars riding the dark night to ends unknown. 

REMEMBERED GRIEF 

Unsettling every thought for woe or weal 
Sorrow comes not in one form unto all 
But comes to each as she may most appall 
And like a false friend, tho' the heart we steel, 
Knowing the armor's weakness — where we feel — 
Turns in the wound the dagger' as we fall 
Betrayed by every fleeing hope we call, 
Afraid of our own daring, to be leal. 

43 



I grieve but to remember so much grief — 
Eternal past that can not be undone! 
It is the loss : let it not be the thief. 
The present — all we have — is in the sun. 
By sorrow, as a blinded man his sight 
Renewed by miracle, I prize delight. 

MELANCHOLY 

The wish without the effort — how misplaced! 
Self-pity's self-betrayal in disguise : 
Its tears are but a blindness to the eyes. 
Wan damsel, shrinking from the world in haste 
Yet sick of thy own gloom and passion waste! 
From clinging sorrow, troubled dream, wilt rise? 
Too like a nymph, when yearning for the skies, 
Drawn down the whirlpool with the wave she 

graced ! 
Thy dearest handmaids — 'thoughts of all delight — 
Go sighing lest they mock. As one would fain 
Dream he is well but wakened by his pain 
Must sleepy-eyed yet sleepless watch the night, 
Thy faint heart, weary of itself, will brood, 
Wistful of pleasure in her highest mood. 

LAUGHTER 

O LAUGHING girls! it does man good 
^ To know there is such joy on earth. 
For youth you laugh and would we could ! 
O laughing girls ! it does man good 
This joy of nature unwithstood. 
Unforced and unsuppressed your mirth, 
O laughing girls ! it does man good 
To know there is such joy on earth. 

44 



TO THE FAIREST 

Be all that you inspire! Embower, 
As fragrance in its tender flower, 
The graces and the sweet of Hfe 
A virtue knowing naught of strife, 
A soul that moves in smiling power! 

O heart like an enchanted tower 
To hold without the storms that lower, 
To laugh within to flute and fife! 
Be all that you inspire! 

Your beauty's right, your nature's dower 
Is love and let its golden hour 
Grow endless springtime ! Wooed or wife, 
Make earthly paths with heavenly rife! 
All joy possess and, radiant, shower! 
Be all that you inspire ! 

THE LOVER'S REPLY 

May one love so oft nor more 
Often, do you ask me yet? 
If I loved, it was to dream 
Of thy coming, love supreme! 
Even to myself I seem, 
As to others, since we met. 
Never to have loved before. 

True to one made one with song, 
Sought in others, found in thee, 
Heart so shrined I must adore ! 
Love, if in my soul before. 
Grows to be that soul and more. 
Once in life such love can be, 
Once because it is as long. 

45 



FAME 

When first we thought upon our fame, 
Sister or sweetheart seemed the name 
That we should call her if she came. 
Daughter ! we greet her, for, behold ! 
She is so young and we so old. 

ROBERT HERRICK 

How springing to thy lips the words 
Are tuneful still and new, 

As if a cage of singing birds 
Were opened and they flew 

Scattering song as sun his beams 

In which the earth as heavenly seems ! 

What busy change to-day will make, 

To-morrow make away! 
For this thy will would never break 

Thy heart but give it play 
That soul and song should fare with joy 
Too native to the heart to cloy. 

Thy joyous eye has made all life 

About thee fair to see 
And with creative fancy rife 

It felt not but for thee — 
Illusion by which art transcends 
The real for ideal ends ! 

POETIC TRUTH 

Each poet gives to poesie 
The something new which is his soul 
And I, whose song has grown with me. 
Seek, beyond self, the whole, 

46 



The vision grant me and I can 
Utter not so much words as things. 
The word is called out of the man 
By that he sees and sings. 

Truth blossoms with a life that takes 
Leafage of joy and fruit of love 
And, more revealed, its beauty makes 
The heaven of song above. 

BARDS OF OLD 

No people wholly conquered hold 

While they retain the songs of old 

To forge anew in hearts of flame 

The sword of freedom and of fame, 

For till they make another tongue 

That never of their freedom sung 

Their own and take the conqueror's name, 

Their hearts, their sires, are still the same. 

THE POET AS PROPHET 

The solitary height of mysteries. 

The common depth of feeling whence they rise. 

As from the Delphic plain to sunlit skies 

Arose the Muses' mountain, how in these 

The poet's gaze illumines what it sees! 

So great a soul is given to his eyes ! 

Uttering his highest moment, ere it flies, 

He looks beyond a world his vision frees. 

Majorities, beginning wrong, grow wise. 

Promethean passion and creative will, 

A heart of heavenly fire that never dies 

But kindles all, they find the poet still — 

The single voice of universal thought! 

Such has it grown, such liberation wrought ! 

47 



HOMER 

If time can make Its dead the more renowned, 

If tears from pity of past tears can start, 

From age to age all changes but the heart. 

There is thy power: there thy fame is found, 

Borne with our wandering race the world around 

And made of all men's heritage a part. 

The song — at once our nature and thy art — 

Enlarges Hellas to the utmost bound. 

Let critics, as they will, divide thee now. 

But multiplying miracles in truth, 

Tho' all too rich for one of them art thou, 

O poet blind in age as if to see 

Thy young world only with the eyes of youth! 

Not by its perished gods, it lives by thee ! 

SONG PERPETUAL 

As the first rose in the last 
Springing from all springtime past, 
So the olden poet's song 
Will renew itself as long 
As the heart its sacred fire. 
And, as youth that takes the lyre 
Is from age to age as young. 
Later lays with his are sung 
Lest it be a lonely voice 
Where all sorrow and rejoice. 

THE POETS OF OUR MOTHER TONGUE 

As Caedmon heralds Milton from afar, 
The great processional of English song 
Still passes onward, age on ages long! 

48 



No end but time's, as never time shall mar 

The noble company whose heirs we are ! 

That earnest beauty and that music strong 

Still perfect, still renew, O poet throng! 

As heaven its pageantry of star on star! 

The world is all an ear to Shakespeare's speech. 

America that took of England heart 

To be more free has in her heirship part. 

How Poe adventured ! Where will others reach ? 

Such joy is song, altho' in sacrifice. 

Preluding harmonies of Paradise! 

MILTON 

Lover of liberty and common right 

Who looked to freedom till the world grew dim 

Beside her glory and the lunar rim 

Cut not the darkness closing on the light! 

Poet whose aim was of an equal height 

E'en with his solace, that the seraphim 

Gave of their fire, their vision and their hymn 

In heavenly recompense of earthly sight ! 

Republican England had so great a voice 

It lives, altho' she perished, and her daughter 

Comes with wild garlands o'er the wild sea water 

To strew the grave of Milton and rejoice 

His shade with fellowship of spirits strong 

In liberty, which is the heart of song. 

THE PILGRIM FATHERS 

It was their soul that led the Pilgrim band 
To come so far and with the wild to cope 
For an ideal end, communal hope. 
For their own freedom, and a freer land 

49 



Than they had known or they could understand 
Is formed on their beginnings, for men grope 
Darkly below but God in lightsome scope 
Completes their purpose with, His own more grand. 
O soul of man that conquers nature still, 
Within him and without, by force of will, 
And, single, calls for aid on God alone! 
Count this reward and triumph that in time 
God bends our action to His own sublime 
And on our aspiration sets His throne! 

GEORGE WASHINGTON 

Without a thought of self, without a fear, 
In power but to serve his native land 
And, when there was no danger to withstand, 
Laying all powers aside and like a seer 
(The mind sees clearly when the heart is clear) 
Counseling hopes of ages yet unscanned, 
Happy, retired, tho' fittest for command, 
The hero, more than crowned, whom all revere, 
A man from whom his country's humblest son 
May learn that greatness is but great good done, 
Whose words are with the force of action sped. 
The power of whose life is never dead. 
Such man can be for such was Washington, 
The man whom glory followed and not led. 

THE "PRESIDENT LINCOLN" 

"President Lincoln !" Fitly was it ours, 

This giant vessel taken from the foe 

Who in a happy moment named it so. 

As if in prophecy that overpowers 

The tongue of Balaam and a blessing showers, 

50 



And where In bronze the words of Lincoln show. 
Fitly in hope of world-wide freedom go 
Our youth that smile upon the war that lowers. 
The vessel sinks beneath them but no fate 
Can sink the name that every year sets higher. 
If names are memories and therefore great, 
If words can speak one soul and all inspire, 
The name, the words, of Lincoln shall abide 
Upon the sea as on the land — our pride ! 

THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Dead? And our grief is loud, 
E'en those who fought him bowed 
With sense of loss and proud 
To claim him as a man 
In all American. 
Her high heroic mood 
His country understood 
And loved in him, her son. 
Whose thought and act were one. 
Dead ! And as then his name, 
While yet he lived, became 
Part of his country's fame. 
So now his life has passed 
Into her own at last! 

OUR COUNTRY'S FLAG 

Our new-world liberty, that at her birth 
Shook the old world, uplifted to the sky 
These stars that brighten to the sun on high 
Like a new heaven over her new earth. 

51 



Fairer with years and all they wrought of worth, 

Her banner streamed on winds of war that nigh 

Rent it asunder, with a deeper dye 

Of crimson hued, ere peace returned and mirth. 

Our heritage of freedom and renown. 

All that high thought and long endearment crown, 

Flag of our country ! all in thee we hold. 

Ever with ampler spread thy colors give 

To be like dawn in heaven to all that live 

And with new glories still recall the old! 

OLD GLORY 

Words that have too much soul to die, 
Deeds that in every age and clime 
Set freedom and set manhood high, 
The aspirations of all time, — 
So well fulfill what they divine 
All glories seem a part of thine. 
Symbol of all that makes men free. 
Of all we have and others hope. 
All that among us finds new scope 
To grow from age to age as we, 
To keep our faith with such a past. 
Look to a future yet more vast 
And to all coming time bequeath 
The flag that with our love we wreathe! 
Traditions grown an instinct make 
A nation : they are in thy mesh 
And ever through the years they take 
A new resplendence for thy sake. 
Our veneration makes thee seem 
Old as the heart of man and fresh 
As a child's eyes of wonder are 
To look upon the morning star 
On rising from a starry dream. 
52 



NOVUS ORDO SECLORUM 

{Motto on the Great Seal of the United States) 

Divide and conquer! so the tyrant plans. 

Unite! and peace and freedom are each man's. 

Men are not free till freed from all alarms 

Nor quite at peace while kingdoms stand in arms. 

One by a common cause and common foes, 

The world's free nations in new union close. 

Our fathers' spirit is our precedent. 

For freedom what untrodden ways they went! 

They crowded with brave change their elder day 

And who dare speak for them yet bid it stay ? 

When theirs was but a nation yet to be, 

They dared to found it and to make it free. 

Allied with distant powers on fought field. 

To all men's rights and conscience they appealed. 

Their thought is ours and, if it more disclose, 

Why see the bud no longer in the rose? 

When despots banded, did our fathers fear ^ 

To challenge them to touch the hemisphere 

About us or bid wait till they drew near? 

The spoilers leagued and reached across the seas 

Now spanned at but a single flight with ease 

And we have won the war we never sought 

And mean to end forever all we fought, 

For this is due mankind and due our dead 

Who, when the victors march, are at their head. 

Monroe! as once the new world was set free 

From tread of conquest, so the old will be. 

For we are gathered in no world intrigue, 

Washington! but in freedom's greater league. 

Not against any but for all we strive, 

The old world we make new: our faith is live. 

53 



Or did our fallen heroes sound retreat? 

To press on where they led us is but meet. 

They have achieved no momentary gain 

But we shall have it ever to maintain. 

Let us preserve as they have given peace. 

God wrought by them : we shall not bid Him cease 

But let the heavens as at the Savior's birth 

Proclaim that good will maketh peace on earth. 

Not singly have we fought nor can withdraw 

With honor from a world that asks for law 

Which force sustains and can not overawe 

That open counsels of the free alone 

May govern world affairs, each folk their own. 

New order of the ages ! this we seal 

As we began it in our commonweal. 

HONOR'S PRAISE 

What praise is due to virtue that is whole, 

If even in base men a good deed shines 

In but a moment's kindling of the soul, 

A single jewel in what darksome mines! 

No longer speak of an immortal name: 

Unfailing manhood should have more to prize — 

A soul above and deeds as high as fame. 

As life is growth, its best within us lies. 

Honor, the good supreme of life, the crown 

Of all our exploits, solace of our death, 

For such a soul it has, the living breath 

Of the least act as much as of renown, 

The soul of knighthood to refrain and dare, 

Its aspiration bids all praise forbear! 



54 



DEATH 

Death comes — if seeming distant, drawing near, 
, So many of the good have gone before, 
So few remain, why dread the further shore 
Nor rather this? Has life no hope more dear 
Or is its end defeat that we should fear? 
Who lives to conquer, would die conqueror. 
How vain were life and death, were there no more! 
It is eternity that opens here. 
Life — the frail power that flutters on a breath, 
Long shadow shortening to the coming day — 
Life is so small a thing beside thee, Death! 
I wonder not thou castest it away, 
I wonder only that we fear thee so, 
Our hope of bliss, deliverance from woe! 

OBLIVION 

Each day hath its own death, is laid asleep 

And is no more — no more to us or less 

Than faded garlands and a cast-off dress. 

What slight remembrance of ourselves we keep! 

Even the dearest memory is deep. 

Deep overlaid with care or new caress. 

So we shall be forgotten in the press 

Of other lives that have their woes to weep. 

We have our day, perchance, or we have not. 

Earth-born are we and in the earth forgot : 

The tree remembers its dead leaves no more. 

God great enough to be to all a friend ! 

But let our cares look ever where they end, 

All time behind, eternity before ! 

55 



SIC TRANSIT GLORIA MUNDI 

What if the many-peopled empire mourn 
The man who wore its crown as 't were a fate. 
Whose life had linked each crisis of the state 
And to whose rule were generations born — 
Like a tall oak of all its foliage shorn, 
Tortured by lightnings, burdened by the weight 
Of tempests all too many — singly great — 
Shaken by earthquake last, he stood forlorn! 
How many tragedies in one life close 
And what exalted sorrows find repose 
In the dark earth and common dust of death! 
Faith lift him thence as others — thence afar. 
Who envies power that superior star? 
Who envies glory if it is men's breath? 

THE COLOSSEUM 

The Roman people have gone forth : we sum 

The destiny of pride, the two-fold sigh, 

Desire, despair, a world of passers-by. 

The ends of Christian faith, the world to come. 

Beyond the concourse loud that is struck dumb. 

What vision had the martyrs? Rise on high. 

Rich with their blood and open to the sky, 

Colossal chalice of their martyrdom ! 

One life, one death with Christ would they partake 

And weakness grew to power for his sake, 

A power that lights and lifts the ruin round. 

We feel their presence: all the ages here 

Are their spectators. Such their acts appear 

They only are the victors, heaven-crowned. 

56 



"ANIMA NATURALITER CHRISTIANA" 

The soul is naturally Christian — so' 

Our nature overleaps all sense-desire, 

As if our dust were star-dust taking fire. 

And yet how blindly, if we nothing know 

Of end or object but this mortal show. 

How all too blindly, soul ! do we aspire ! 

But part is this or nature is a liar. 

Faith made thee whole, for heaven it would bestow 

Upon the yearnings which in faith we see 

Sublimed, consoled and fortified, as tho' 

The hand of God would fashion, swift or slow, 

Both grace and nature to one end in thee. 

So consonant with nature, faith above 

Gives God to be at once both hope and love. 

MIDNIGHT 

Over the cluttered city I espy. 
Upon a level from this window high. 
The rising moon half putting darkness by. 
How heavenly her look ! How strangely nigh ! 
So near is glory but no wings have I — 
Hardly the faint uplifting of a sigh — 
But like the dark beneath that splendor lie 
And look, all speechless, to the silent sky. 
God's face is hidden but my soul is bare 
E'en to a moonbeam: He is present there. 
The beauty in all beauty deepest found. 
If God made joy and men made sorrow, where 
His light is fuller which shall be our share? 
It comforts life and death He is their bound. 

57 



HOPE NATURAL AND SUPERNATURAL 

Careless of loss and confident of time, 

I feel a force of life like nature's own 

Biding the spring, when all is overblown, 

To win the songster with his warmer clime 

And, all creative, constant to relimn, 

Refashion, rather than preserve alone 

The sunset glories, each a moment shown. 

The flower whose seed is flowers, the vanished rime ; 

And when I come to die I shall not pause 

Upon the past but take, in life's embrace, 

The ends of life. Dust, for so much, the price? 

Our dust ! All gathered in the soul a space. 

Life overleaps the flesh and for this cause 

Love passed through death and made it Paradise. 

ENLARGED 

The world was not so fair as she 
And fairer tho' her presence made it, 
She and its brightest sun must flee. 
The dusk o'ershade it. 

To gloaming earth, O radiant sun! 

The moon, thy lovely image, leave 

And of thy rays the tenderest one. 

The star of eve. 

"What old remembrance, what new hope. 
What nearer consciousness of heaven, 
Immortal love, eternal scope. 
To time are given ! 

58 



THE UNBELIEVER 

He who believes not in a God believes not in the 

soul — 
So much of the divine it shares — and even at his 

goal 
Bears witness that apart from God he is himself 

not whole. 

MAN IN THE UNIVERSE 

Our understanding reaches to that star 

That hath no consciousness of its own light. 

We weigh it in our mind altho' afar : 

So much is thought above its mass and might. 

The eye hath more than radiance, having sight, 

And with that sense is reason — let none mar 

Faith also — for the heavens have such height 

That so the soul may find no bound or bar. 

Our death is but to be as all things are, 

So far as we are flesh, that is in chains : 

Our life is spirit and so much remains, 

Trampling our dust with its triumphal car, 

And man is not so much in thought partaker 

With all that we behold as with its Maker. 



59 



TO THE CITY OF SAN FRANCISCO 
REARISEN 

(Pindaric Ode) 

City of victory, looking afar, 

Risen from flame as of sunset a star 

Nobly serene, 

Set for a crown o'er the down-drifting days, 

How shall we gather the strands of thy praise 

Fitly, O queen? 

How shall we utter thy life and thy story? 

Thine are the splendor of nature, the spirit of glory. 

Named for the pilgrim from all so unbound 

He, in his spirit, beatitude found, 

Joy in but living 

Sweetly conversant with nature and God, 

Lover of all from the sky to the sod, 

Life of thanksgiving, 

Francis, the saint and the poet in one, 

Thou art the city as he was the bard of the sun. 

Here the brethren of Francis were isled 
In the peace that they made in the wild 
Where they founded the chapel that stood 
In the vale, where the herbage was good, 
And it stands in the midst of thy ways 
As a prayer still beginning thy days. 
In the year that our freedom had birth. 
Thou wast sprung at the end of the earth 
As a light to the seas without shore 
For what Argonauts waiting of yore ! ' 

60 



Riding the wind on the tides of the Hght, 
Galleys that under full sail in slow flight 
Hover off-shore, 

Hued with the sun o'er the shimmering wave, 
Clouds that enlarge the sun's glory are brave 
Now as of yore. 

Nature, immortal co-worker with man, 
Strews to the laughter of showers the flowers of 
Pan. 

Cool as in shade from a summer of sky, 
Beaming all sun on the mountain-top nigh, 
Wreathe thee and veil. 
After bright noons, in the vapor of ocean, 
Gate of the winds, without tempest, in motion 
Swelling the sail 

Shoreward and spreading a mist till the sun 
Flood with a golden resplendence the course it has 
run! 

How aroused was thy day-dreaming youth 

To be won by our arms yet in truth 

As a bride by her lover who goes 

To his joy in the flight of his foes ! 

To the streams that were running with gold 

Eldorado would beckon of old. 

In thy port are the ships of all seas 

And the men of all lands they are these. 

Yet if gladdened with greatness, thou art 

The more stirred to a greatness of heart. 

All of this body of riches and power, 
Populous mart and paradise-bower, 
All of it sprung 

61 



Out of thy heart as love given and won, 

Out of thy soul as the dawn from the sun 

Ever as young, 

Spirit unseared by the flame — a new wreath — 

Conquering spirit unshaken by earthquake beneath ! 

Earth — was it stirred for thy coming in state?— 
Ocean to ebb and to flood at thy gate, 
Sea-cliff and scaur, 

Bays that outspread and mountains that rise 
Forested deep or in snowland of skies, 
Islands afar, 

Sun over all, are as raiment for thee. 
Gracing thy grandeur with theirs as an isle with 
the sea! 

In the falling away of the surge 
Will the next billow gather and urge 
The embosoming waters more high 
And the march of the ocean grow nigh 
And from out of the doubt fulest strife 
Ever breaks the full force of thy life. 
Let the past be thy herald and be 
As a trumpet of triumph to thee! 
In thy soul let us read the far years! 
Still surpass every hope! Perish fears! 



S2 



